This object is available for public use. Individuals interested in reproducing this object in a publication, web site or for any commercial purpose must first receive written permission from the Brown University Library.

This epithet began life in early spring, 1908, when
A. R. Orage, as the new solo editor of the
“new”New
Age, chose to publish a series of divergent
opinions on socialist policies. He probably wished to
demonstrate that the paper was more than an organ of
established socialist (i. e., Fabian) organizations.

What has become known as the "Chesterbelloc" controversy commenced with Hilaire
Belloc's “Thoughts on Modern
Thought” (02.06: 108), which pointed out a
dangerous authoritarianism in some of the policies of the
Fabian socialists. In the next issue (02.10: 189) for 4
January 1908, G. K. Chesterton contributed an essay,
“Why I am Not a
Socialist.” This probably was designed to
counter Arnold Bennett's earlier “Why I
am a Socialist”(02.05: 90) as well as to
adumbrate Belloc's views in the earlier piece.

In the next issue, for 11 January, H. G. Wells contributed
an article, “About Chesterton and
Belloc ”(02.11:209). A three-way debate was
launched, and in the issue for 15 February 1908 (02:309),
George Bernard Shaw attacked both Chesterton and Belloc in an
essay that instantly became a classic for its fabulous if
somewhat nasty parody. GBS described a mythical four-legged
beast/prophet that had appeared to save civilization from the
dangers of liberal collectivism: G. K. Chesterton (1874-1936)
and Hilaire Belloc (1870-1953).

Shaw called this beast the Chesterbelloc — implying that the fat
hindquarters represented an overweight Chesterton and the pointy-nosed front
portion a long-nosed, supercilious and judgmental, if skinny, Belloc. This term
stuck to the two writers ever after, as they labored to convince England of
the psychological and moral dangers of big government, technology, and science
— the brave new world of state social control.

Chesterton's and Belloc's memorable friendship had begun in 1900.
With the assist of this episode, their literary partnership blossomed
into a lifetime journalistic assault upon the ills of the 20th
century. Both prolific authors, they produced hundreds of books
dealing with this panoply of issues. Belloc's groundbreaking book The Servile State (1912) has
been called the seminal book in warning of the dangers of
totalitarianism.

Generally, the interpretation has been that the Chesterbelloc
represented a common set of opinions shared by the two men. However,
according to James Corrin, that was not, apparently, GBS's original
intent. Rather, ““Chesterbellocisms,” in
Shaw's use of the term[,] were opinions dictated by Belloc which
Chesterton expressed without having discovered them for
himself” (Corrin 27). Shaw created this
unnatural beast to represent the mistaken union of the two men,
suggests Corrin.

Scholars suggest that GBS probably never understood GKC. Shaw considered GKC
the more brilliant of the Chesterbellocian duo, but implied that, in the debate
at hand, Belloc was taking the lead in their thinking and in fact leading GKC
astray. Indeed, Chesterton's official biographer, Maisie Ward, has confirmed
that GKC probably took most of his ideas from Belloc. Nonetheless, Ward judges
GKC the better thinker of the two, even while Belloc may have been the more
systematic philosopher. Although little love was lost between GBS and Belloc,
GKC and GBS remained lifelong friends.

As one scholar has pointed out, Shaw and the Chesterbelloc asked the same question
of society: what to do about all these poor people? Their answers were different,
but they were engaged in the same issues. The Chesterbelloc's critique
of collectivism tore gaping holes in Fabian philosophy and many people were
drawn away from Fabianism because of it. The debate also helped Chesterton and
Belloc clarify their arguments for the movement that soon was called Distributism.